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Letter to the Editor
Teodoro's mission impossible
MANILA, Philippines- Defense
Secretary Gilberto Teodoro said President Macapagal-Arroyo has an order to
make insurgency irrelevant by 2010. (Inquirer, 7/25/08)
A tall order and an oversimplification of the deep-seated concerns and
issues that gave rise to the insurgency in the first place. General
discontent, dissent and struggles for social transformation—through armed
or parliamentary struggle—will always hound us for as long as injustice
and social inequality remain pervasive in a nation richly endowed with
vast natural resources and talented human resources. Teodoro's mission
would be accomplished if:
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Poverty and hunger would be
eliminated by giving highest priority to programs providing basic and
social services to the majority poor.
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Genuine agrarian reform would
be implemented. GMA would sincerely address the problem of unemployment
and the workers would receive just and decent salaries.
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GMA would be made accountable
for the many corruption scandals under her administration.
●
GMA would stop lying.
●
The Comprehensive Agreement on
Human Rights and International Humanitarian Laws would be respected.
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The EVAT would be scrapped.
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All children of school age
would have access to quality public education.
●
All public hospitals are
clean, operate with the necessary medical facilities and dedicated health
professionals and personnel who are receiving just wages and are
accessible to the poor.
●
There is no sellout of our
national patrimony. The people's democratic rights are not trampled upon
by a government that covers up crimes against the people.
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These are among the few "ifs"
that can be achieved. They may not constitute all that is needed for a
just and lasting peace, but certainly once these are addressed decisively,
GMA's order will be achieved even before 2010.
The real problem is not the insurgency. It is the irrelevance of the
administration and policies of Ms Arroyo, whose greed can't be moderated.
Every day, thousands of Filipinos join the ranks of hungry people; or
leave the country, risking lives and limbs so they can feed their
families; every day we hear stories of misery, sickness and death because
of poor social services, and of funds (that could have been used to
improve the lot of the Filipino majority) ending up in the pockets of
corrupt leaders in the highest echelons of government.
Teodoro wanted us to listen to GMA's Sona. Do we need to listen to the
Sona to understand the everyday issues? Shouldn't it be the other way
around—the defense secretary listening to the people's Sona? To be sure,
one can't know the real state of the nation if he/she is cocooned in
his/her blind loyalty to a President whose electoral victory remains
suspect to this day.
—NORMA P. DOLLAGA, general secretary, Kapatirang Simbahan Para Sa Bayan (Kasimbayan),
3/F NCCP 979 Edsa, Quezon City
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